Noah
EVERYTHING IN THE palace carried on like nothing had changed. Montclair ran smoothly, the way it always had before I arrived and the way it would long after I was gone.
But for me, everything had changed.
With no explanation from Baxter or anyone, my duties had been quietly rearranged now that Nicholas no longer required my presence.
He didn’t send for me at night or ask for me in the morning.
Reynolds attended to him now, along with another footman named Pierce sometimes.
Both of them were competent and discreet and perfectly suited to the work of a king’s senior footman.
They’d done nothing wrong, but still…I hated them for it.
Okay, maybe hate was a strong word, since the reason for all the changes had nothing to do with them.
It was my own fault. I wanted to blame someone else, even Nicholas, but in the end I’d made my own decisions and had to live with the consequences.
I’d always known that deep down, but for some reason I’d carried a secret bit of hope that somehow things could be different.
Ridiculous. I knew that. Kings couldn’t love footmen. Not in public, anyway.
It would be easier if Nicholas were cruel—if I could be mad at him, hate him, anything to get over the sick feeling in my gut that came from knowing then losing his love.
Instead, in the handful of times I’d seen him, he’d been formal and polite enough, reminiscent of the cold man I’d met when I first started my post here.
It had been thirteen days—not that I was counting—since the last time he’d been Nicholas and I’d been Noah, when I was sent up to the council tea.
Apparently, half the footmen were busy with preparations for the upcoming coronation meetings, which was why I was tasked with carrying the tray into the council chamber that afternoon.
Nicholas sat at the head of the long table with Prince Gabriel, Gilbert, and several other esteemed men and women, while Baxter stood nearby awaiting any instruction.
Lord Chamberlain was speaking, my presence not something to even notice, the way it should be, but out of the corner of my eye I saw Nicholas stiffen.
I tried not to look his way, to not notice the composed expression on his face or the dark suit and tie he wore, or the way his fingers inched toward his fountain pen like he was itching to fidget.
But I failed. My gaze traveled to him like it always did, but before I could look away, he glanced up and those beautiful blues locked on mine.
For several foolish heartbeats, it was all still there between us: the secret passage, the warmth of his bed, Whitefall Cliffs. His telling me he loved me, even though it was the last thing he should’ve said.
Then Gilbert tapped something on his open laptop, and the sound snapped me out of my trance.
I bowed my head. “Your Majesty.”
“Mr. Bennett.” Nicholas had already schooled his features again, and I made myself do the same.
Mr. Bennett. Not Noah, not even Bennett in that low voice that always wrapped around me like a caress.
The tray felt heavier as I moved around the table to pour the tea. When I reached Nicholas, I willed my hands not to shake. If they did, I would fling myself off the balcony from shame.
I already knew how Nicholas took his tea: one sugar on a normal day or when he was tired or stressed, but none if he was angry. A splash of milk only if he hadn’t eaten all of his breakfast and I wanted to pester him into having something more.
I reached for the sugar, but then realized that was too intimate, too presumptuous, especially in a room full of people.
“Sugar, Your Majesty?”
Nicholas didn’t look at me again, only shook his head. “No. Thank you.”
I poured his tea plain, and this close I could see the faint shadows beneath his eyes and the tension in his jaw.
He wanted sugar today. I knew that, and he knew that I knew that.
Still, I set the cup down as though I knew nothing about him at all. When our fingers nearly brushed, he jerked his hand away, and it was like a stab to the heart.
“Will there be anything else, Your Majesty?” My words came out polite, professional, not shaky at all, which was a miracle considering I thought my knees were about to buckle.
“No, Mr. Bennett. That will be all.”
I bowed my head and continued around the table, refilling each cup to their preference while they carried on with their meeting like I wasn’t there.
Then I looked at Nicholas and bowed, even though he wasn’t paying attention to me, and had started to leave when Gabriel called out, “Actually, Mr. Bennett?”
I stopped and turned. “Yes, Your Royal Highness?”
His eyes traveled to Nicholas before coming back to me. “Would you have Mrs. Stuart send up some of those delicious Jammie Dodgers? The ones that even Baxter can’t resist?”
Baxter’s expression didn’t move as he said, “I can resist, sir.”
Gabriel grinned. “See that face? He’s weak for them.”
A few of the men and women at the table chuckled…but Nicholas didn’t.
I bowed my head. “Of course, Your Royal Highness.”
When I looked up, Gabriel held my gaze for just a moment longer, and I thought I saw sympathy in his eyes, but I didn’t want that. Not from him or anyone.
I left the room and had made it halfway down the corridor before I realized I’d forgotten how to breathe. By the time I reached the servants’ stairs, the ache in my chest had sharpened into anger.
Good. It was easier to be angry. Better to help me get over my temporary lapse in sanity.
So I went looking for Violet.
Ever since my last interaction with Nicholas, I’d been running over our conversation.
Front to back, top to bottom. What had I said?
What had I done to make him totally freeze me out?
I’d been telling myself it was just the way it had to be, and so he was finally taking the steps to distance himself, but this seemed more than that.
It was just so abrupt. So final. There had to be a reason, and the last person to see him before the arctic blast had been Violet.
I stormed down the hall toward the kitchen where the downstairs usually congregated between jobs, and when I walked into the dining hall I drew up short as Charlie, Violet, and Pierce looked in my direction.
“You need something, Bennett?” Charlie said, a smug curl to his lip that I was itching to punch off. I’d seen the sly looks he’d aimed my way whenever Reynolds or Pierce were called to attend the king in my place, and while he’d yet to say anything to my face, I knew he was talking behind my back.
“Violet,” I said, turning my attention away from him, knowing my patience was razor thin. “Can I please see you for a minute?”
She frowned but quickly finished off her drink and excused herself, getting to her feet.
I turned into the silverware room, and she stepped inside with a curious look on her face.
“Baxter has you in here today?”
“No.” Not that it was that difficult to imagine. It felt as though Baxter had been dreaming up jobs for me lately, and polishing all the silverware seemed like an apt punishment for my mere existence. “I wanted to ask you something, and this is as good a place as any.”
I shut the door, and she whirled around. “Is everything okay? Do you need help with—”
“What did you say to him?” The words were out of my mouth and hanging in the air between us before I could think them through. This question had been festering inside me ever since I was dismissed from Nicholas’s service.
Violet cocked her head. “Say to…?”
“Nicholas? His Majesty. The king.” I started to pace the small room, running a hand through my hair. “You had to have said something to him that morning you found my glove.” I spun around to pin her with accusatory eyes. “What was it?”
“I already told you—”
“There has to be more!”
She startled at my raised voice, and I couldn’t blame her. I sounded like a madman.
“Noah, I promise,” she said softly. “I didn’t say anything other than what I told you.”
I shook my head, almost maniacally, as she stepped forward. But I didn’t want her kindness, not when I felt as though I were falling apart.
“That’s not possible. It’s not. He wouldn’t just cut me off. He wouldn’t shut me out like this.” I dropped my head into my hands. “He wouldn’t be this…this…callous unless you said something.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, willing my tears not to fall, but it was too late. I could already feel them on my cheeks.
“Oh, Noah.” Violet reached for my arm and tugged it away. “I’m so sorry.”
My eyes stung as the tears came even harder, my shoulders trembling as all of the emotions I’d kept bottled up finally came pouring out—the pain, the loss, the heartache. I’d come untethered and felt as though I were floating through an empty void.
Violet reached for me, pulling me into a tight hug and offering up words of sympathy mixed with encouragement, but it was useless. Nothing was going to fix the hole Nicholas had left in my heart, certainly not taking it out on the one person who had always been there for me.
“I’m sorry,” I said when I could finally find my voice again.
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” Violet brushed a tear from my cheek and looked at me with a sad smile. “I can’t begin to imagine what you’re going through right now.”
“He hardly even looks at me,” I whispered.
“Probably because he can’t bear it.”
I shook my head, then Violet took my hand and squeezed.
“That morning, when we spoke, he was troubled. He didn’t know what to do about you, how to keep you safe.” She gave a small shrug. “Maybe this is his way of doing that.”
“By hurting me?”
“By sacrificing his happiness to give you a chance of it…later.”
The thought was inconceivable, that I’d be able to find happiness without him. That this cold dismissal was the best option.
“He knew people were talking,” she said. “People were starting to put the two of you together, and not just as the king and his footman. Noah…you knew how this would end. The only way it could end. He’s doing you a favor.”
“It doesn’t feel like a favor. It feels like he’s ripping my heart out with his bare hands.”
“And maybe that’s for the best.” She let out a soft sigh. “Sometimes it’s easier to forget someone when you hate them.”
That was the problem. I could never hate Nicholas. I just hated the situation we found ourselves in. But that wasn’t Violet’s fault. It wasn’t anyone's but our own.
“So now what?” I said. “I just exist as a ghost in his palace? Drift through the halls and disappear into the shadows whenever he’s close? How am I supposed to do that? How do I go back to before?”
“You push any other feeling aside. You tell yourself he’s a heartless king. You do whatever you need to get through the days you still feel him stealing into your heart. But you must do it. He’s getting married. He’s not for you.”
And that was the crux of it. Nicholas would soon be coronated. Then wed.
And the man I’d fallen in love with would no longer exist.
The best I could hope for was to put my head down and go about my job. Treat our relationship like the dream it had been.
Violet was right. Now it was time to wake up.